rominl

iTrader: (4)

it's safe to say i have worked on about 30+ ls460 (swb and lwb), and i can say you are partially right. some people they are very sensitive, maybe too sensitive after reading this thread, and they complain about even normal road noise and say that's wind noise

HOWEVER, there are cars with real serious horrible wind noise problem, 2 to be exact, both swb. i didn't even have to get to freeway speed, just 50mph local and i was like wtf was that. it's that bad. so you can do the math, 2 out of 30+, could be my luck, but when you have it, you really have it

justintm99

What I said did not come out quite right. Please allow me to rephrase. It's possible that all LS460s have wind noise problems but some people are more able to tolerate the problem than others.

baysurfer

Well I read all 50 pages of this thread and now have a better understanding of the variables that could cause the differences in the perception of the noise. I want to make it clear that I noticed the wind noise then googled about it to see if there was any information on it. Had I known about this discussion before I bought the car, I would not have bought it. I have an appointment with a dealer this week to fix a few things on the car so it will interesting the response I get.

baysurfer

Well I am a little excited today. This morning when I drove my car to work I tried the trick of letting the driver's side front window down ever so slightly. The wind noise got noticeably better. Not dramatically but noticeable. I don't think I have the triangle piece problem. I don't get the car noise from other cars just the swishing wind sound up around my left ear when I'm doing 70ish. (I did the thump test and it's pretty solid)

With the window rolled all the way up till it' s buried in the channel there is more noise from the outside than when you back it off just a hair. It is so slight a downward movement that I have to "peck" the button down to hit the spot. It sent chills down my spine when the noise lessened. I honesty was skeptic about people saying that their noise lessened with downward travel. But I feel a whole lot better because A) now I can let the tech hear the difference for themselves (it's not imaginary if I can show a difference) and B) I don't have to do the triangle fix (at least not now).

What would be super cool is if I can record the difference in sound with a camcorder. This would show that you don't see a difference in the height of the glass but you can hear the difference.

justintm99

Wind noise is OK too. My LS460 must be amongst the quietest cars on the road today, but then it has always been. Let me explain.

My car still has plenty of road noise, tire noise, and of course wind noise. Plenty of wind noise. I knew about this thread before I purchased the car, I was forewarned and prepared. I had other people with me during the test drive. In the end I was still defeated. The problem I had with the car is insidious, the kind of problems that makes customers look unreasonable, and talented and dedicated service departments ineffectual.

There may have been people with the same problem who then returned their cars to Lexus, cars that Lexus could not find anything wrong with. When I test drove my LS, any reasonable person would have concluded that the car was fine. It's not the kind of problem that would reveal itself in a test drive, even a very lengthy one as was our case.

I believe at the root of the problem is the LS quiet cabin. Lexus lowered the noise floor so much that noise bursts became an issue for some. There are two ways wind noise can get to you, through leakage into the cabin or via transmission from the glass itself. The glass acts as a speaker plate vibrating and transmitting changes in air pressure to the cabin. How efficient it transmits depends on its mass. The greater the mass, the less it can transmit. The seals also add a coefficient of damping.

A fix that can diffuse the peak of the noise bursts will reduce the ratio of peak to background. Under normal driving conditions, you would still hear wind noise, but it's a non-distracting, even soothing type of noise. Whereas before I struggled to ignore wind noise, now I would need to make an effort to hang on to it.

It’s unlikely that you can find this problem during a test drive because you need random noise bursts to experience the effect, and then you need time to assess whether or not it would be a problem for you. Noise bursts jar the brain into a useless stimulus response sequence (what's that? oh, it's just the wind) over and over again. Tiring for me, may be perfectly OK for others.

I am only describing my version of the wind noise experience. If you don't have this problem, I would not be surprised, and I wouldn't mess with fixing it.

jmcraney

Here is an ad for a 2007 LS460, 11000 miles, that has been running for several months on the Internet. This might be a good "fixer-upper" for someone with an understanding of the wind noise problem that affects many of these cars.

Link to the ad: http://505motoring.com/inventory/car_detail.php?id=205

The disclaimer with this ad is interesting.

Quote
PLEASE READ: We are offering this beautiful car because it was repurchased by LEXUS of North America due to the following minor issue:

1. Wind Noise

This is literally all that was wrong with this over $70,000 MSRP car. The vehicle was inspected by LEXUS and was found that it met manufacturers specifications. In other words, there were no real issues, the car was perfect and they repurchased the car to maintain customer loyalty.

As they often do, this was a "goodwill buyback" and an attempt to satisfy their customer. We have driven and tested this car and it drives like new with NO issues! LEXUS has provided us with a disclosure of the original complaint for you to review and sign at the time of purchase. This process does not affect the factory warranty in any way and the car has the FULL balance of the LEXUS factory warranty for 4-years / 50,000 miles. Most importantly, in addition to undergoing rigorous testing prior to being placed back into the market, the full warranty remains on this vehicle until 07/23/2011 or 50,000 miles. The car also qualifies for many of the Extended Warranties that are available on the market. These cars are the core of our business, and we feel they represent one the absolute best values in the highline car market today. Dealing exclusively with Mercedes-Benz, BMW & LEXUS Buybacks, we know the inner-workings of the program by working directly with key Manufacturer personnel and have a full understanding of their mindset regarding satisfying the customer "at all costs." It is this customer approach and true nature of the “issues” that make these cars such a great offering to potential customers like yourself. The cars are rigorously tested, as it is the goal of LEXUS to have 100% satisfaction with the new owner. You will receive an Ohio title with a "Buyback Vehicle" notation. Other states might not recognize the Lemon Law/Buyback brand, so your State title may not have this notation. Please call your local BMV (Bureau of Motor Vehicles) to confirm.

We thank you for reading this far and hope we have a chance to discuss this beautiful car and the LEXUS of North America program with you further. We will be happy to arrange any type of additional inspection of your choosing. Thanks and hope to hear from you soon!!
End Quote

rjm

Did I miss the price on this "bargain" or did they not publish it?

CJITTY

First of all, I will say again. Big Props to jmcraney for everything he has done for us on CL about this issue. The triangles he sent me was such a nice gesture, I can't thank you enough for doing that. The fix took care of my triangle related noise for sure! But I have even better news. Lexus is fixing my car as I type this with by addressing all the TSBs, except the triangles since those are solid now. I'm getting new Lamisafes and weatherstripping up front. I can't wait to be driving my 380HP rolling tomb of silence soon lol...CL is such a wonderful thing

I8ABMR

I was very happy with the wind noise fix, but after the fix the drivers side mirror started whistling and that had to be replaced and now the pieces of the door frame are not as tight as they should be. I called my rep today to tell him that the pieces of the door frame seem like they are pulled away from the frame itself. I feel bad also because when the dealership did the wind noise fix for me with the jmcraney pieces Lexus charged tried to charge it back to the dealership but when my rep explained that I am a "loyalist " of Lexus and a huge Club Lexus freak they backed off because they knew I would have complained on the forum. In the end I feel bad that the dealership was harrassed by Lexus. ( In the end they actually did charge back the seat discomfort tsib on the passenger seat because I never complained about that side. They said trying to match the color of the leather wasnt a good enough reason)

Maurice

I did not realized I was still subscribed to this thread. CJITTY post triggered an email that reminded me of the huge annoyance I had with my '07 LS460 and wind noise and the amazing insights that jmcraney provided.

It has been one year since the lease ended on my 460LS, and I was thrilled to return it to Lexus. This experienced soured me to Lexus (for now - maybe forever) after 15 years and several LS iterations.

So when the lease ended on the LS I went with a BMW 750i. After one year I can say the 750i is by far the best car I have owned (including all the LS's - prior favorite was the 2004 LS).

The car is a joy and incredible fun to drive. The electronics, navigation, gadgets, etc., which worried me, are superb. And the dealer experience is far better than the last one with Lexus. Actually I have not yet been to a dealer. They delivered the car to my home. Since, they picked up the car and left a loaner the 2 times it has gone in (oil change and software upgrade). All maintenance is included for the life of the lease.

Had I not been so poorly treated by Lexus, I would have likely not even tried a different brand. When this lease ends in 23 months I am already planning a European delivery of the next BMW. There are at least 4 family members and friends that have done the same after the Wind Noise demo on my '07.

The only thing I miss is this great forum.

CJITTY

didn't mean to stir up bad memories..my bad

Stoks

Okay, this is going to come off a bit rough...but so be it.

For someone who has already expended so much energy on previous posts talking about your dissatisfaction with Lexus, why are you still coming over here and stirring the pot?

Really, I'm sorry you had such a horrible experience with your Lexus. Yet, you should understand that despite what you say, BMW's are almost legendary for their massive depreciation and lack of reliability. I literally laugh when I see one of these money pits go by me on the road (see, we all have the capacity to harbor extreme opinions). The difference is, that I don't seek out BMW forums to take jabs at the brand.

Maybe you're the lucky one and somehow, someway avoided all this. If so, I'm happy for you. Just understand that for people who have been on this board for a number of years, we got your message long ago.

As a result, please consider the suggestion to unsubscribe yourself from this thread so as to lessen the likelihood of you getting worked up again over your poor Lexus experience. I wouldn't trade my LS460 for your BMW. You can keep it.

Happy driving.

marky2mark

I too did Jeff's DYI triangle fix and when I take the car in for the 30k service I want to ask for the Lamisafe windows. Did you tell the dealer that you did the triangle fix yourself? I was afraid if I told them they would try to blame the wind noise on that, but if I didn't tell them they might try to take the triangle pieces off and mess up the fix that I did.

CJITTY

Thanks to Club Lexus and of course this thread, I went back to my dealer to look into the noise issue again, I brought it up initially before my 50K was up when I was in for the VSR, but the issue really wasn't investigated and that the noise was deemed "normal". I knew about the triangle fix, but somehow missed this particular thread with all these pages and found my VIN was within the range of cars impacted. I then got smart on all the known wind noise TSBs and went back to my dealer to inquire about this and spoke to the svc mgr and also my advisor.

The main technician came out and I told him all about the triangle fix and that i already did that fix and it took care of that particular noise. Plus I told him I was aware of the TSBs including the Lamisafe change out. He told me he was impressed with my knowledge on the topic I also told him that I can do the "power window button down" trick, which actually helps but it is not supposed to be that way. He told me he was aware of that also. So, they looked over the car, made some initial observations and I had to bring it back in. Lexus made sure there were no other issues and svc advisor told me that they are doing the fixes minus the triangle because I got that thing solid already! I am just glad I complained about the overall wind noise before my 50K was up and have it on record as doing so because they sure didn't have to fix it. I am grateful they are! Besides the initial dismissal of the wind noise, Lexus has really listened to my concerns and fixed several TSB related issues I have addressed with them. As far as being scared, don't be. They know this is an issue and the TSBs prove that. I would print out the TSBs and the jmcraney fix diy with pictures. The triangle is just one part of the overall noise issue as I understand it. Hopefully they will take care of you, but don't be scurrrred

marky2mark

Thanks. What is the "power window button down" trick?

Also does anyone have details for these TSB's?

SB0026-10 Front side window wind noise at highway speeds
SB0020-10 Front door window highway speed wind noise
SB0007-10 Front door window wind noise above 45 mph
SB0033-09 highway speed crosswind turbulence noise


Thanks!